Please allow me to introduce myself to you all. I am Christopher J. Wagner, and I am your Student Senate president for the 50th session of Senate. For all of you who do not know what that means, I will be taking over as Senate president April 3, and I will remain president until mid-Spring 2007.

Many of the articles I have been reading in The Spectator and The Flip Side recently have hinted Student Senate does not give adequate information to the public. In order to expect higher student participation, we need to better educate our community on critical issues facing our campus.

So, here you go. This is like my initial address. If anyone has any questions about Student Senate or what I intend to do while leading the 50th session, please feel free to write responses to my articles and drop them off at my office in Davies Center to tell me how you are feeling. And, for those of you who do not know where that is, it is in the middle of Davies on the first floor. If you are between the Cabin and Spitfires, there is a sign outside the Senate office doorway.

We need to expand. I come with a proposal – to create more buildings on campus. This equals more jobs in our community. More jobs in our community leads to a better functioning economy. A better economy allows our city to grow. A city growing creates dependency for people within to maintain the economy. If our enrollment increases, the economy then can prosper. A set of new buildings would afford us this goal.

By increasing our property value, we can increase interest in our university. And, in creating this, we could provide a larger variety of classes and increased enrollment.

Increasing enrollment also feeds United Hall Council’s Clearwater Hall Project, which does research on the demand for a new residence hall. The student body has already made plans to build a new student union, and the university administration has already made plans for a new academic building. It is only so long before students will pay for these plans, and the price tag increases each year.

The time is now, UW-Eau Claire! Support this work now, and we will have a bright future.

A baby can never walk if we prohibit its first steps. That is where we are standing today – at our first steps. We are taking the first steps of our adult lives, and whatever we do to invest in ourselves will ultimately improve our future identity. We already find ourselves investing in our future every time we pay tuition.

Many scorn this investment, but we still seem committed to pay tuition each year, regardless. If we agree to pay a little more now to increase our university’s stature, we will benefit by increasing the value of our diplomas. And we also give something to the incoming generations of students as well.

Believe it or not, someone once believed in future students at Eau Claire and made a proposal to build our Davies Center.

My proposal for Eau Claire involves building a new student union, along with a new academic building, a new performance arts center, a new residence hall and a new campus school. Davies Center no longer meets many state codes, like those for electrical wiring. Brewer is also getting too old. The music and arts students deserve a new, bigger place to hold recitals, concerts and productions.

They alone are drawing in the most consistent income on events for our campus. And the use of motels, nearly routinely for 10 years, to house our students is
unacceptable, especially when we
potentially can build a new residence hall with innovative, new technologies.

But where does the money come from?

Students. That is right; we will pay the greater portion of this. There is potential to lobby for funds from the state for some things, but a lot of it would come directly
from us.

I know tuition increases are a large concern to us all, and no one wants this to happen.
But, if we do, can you imagine the impact Eau Claire would have on the state? The sooner we support these issues, the less expensive they will be.

We claim to be a school acknowledging excellence. I think its time we prove it.

Stand up, renovate, pay a little more now and see how far excellence takes us. Someday, a student going to Eau Claire may thank you.

Wagner is a senior psychology and history double major, Student Senate president and a columnist for The Spectator.